(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for formatting a recordable optical disk with application-specific format data written to the recordable optical disk.
(2) Description of the Related Art
There are several types of compact disk which include a CD-R (compact disk-recordable), a CD-E (compact disk-erasable), and a CD-RW (compact disk-rewritable). Generally, in the CD-R, data can be written only one time, and in the CD-E and the CD-RW, data can be written many times. Hereinafter, these types of compact disk will be called a recordable optical disk.
A recordable optical disk, such as the CD-RW, which is made of a phase-change recording material, is known. In such an optical disk, a first protection layer, a recording layer, a second protection layer, and a reflection/heat-radiation layer are sequentially deposited on a substrate of a suitable resin material. These layers are produced, as laminated films on the substrate, through sputtering. A UV (ultraviolet ray) curing resin is coated onto the reflection/heat-radiation layer to form an overcoat layer.
In the above-mentioned optical disk, the recording layer is made of a phase-change recording material. When the phase-change recording material is heated and gradually cooled, the recording material is held in a crystalline status. On the other hand, when the phase-change recording material is melted and rapidly cooled, the recording material is in an amorphous status.
When information is recoded to the above-mentioned optical disk, an intensity of a light beam emitted to the recording layer is modulated in accordance with a record signal. The phase-change recording material of the recording layer is varied between the crystalline state and the amorphous state in a reversible manner by the light beam whose intensity is modulated by the record signal. A sequence of marked portions and non-marked portions are formed in the recording layer of the optical disk in accordance with the information recorded thereto. The marked portions on the optical disk are formed with the amorphous status of the phase-change recording material which is irradiated by the light having a high intensity. The non-marked portions on the optical disk are formed with the crystalline status of the phase-change recording material which is irradiated by the light having a low intensity.
After the recording layer is produced by using the sputtering, the phase-change recording material of the recording layer is in the amorphous status. In order to allow information to be rewritten to the above-mentioned optical disk, it is necessary to initialize or format the optical disk so that the entire recording layer is held in the crystalline status.
As for a magneto-optical disk, even if a defective sector is found in the magneto-optical disk during a formatting process, a primary defect list (PDL) indicating the location of the defective sector is prepared by a disk drive. The disk drive is able to have an error-corrective access to the magneto-optical disk by detecting the location of the defective sector from the PDL. A volume production of the magneto-optical disk which is formatted in this manner is possible.
However, regarding the recordable optical disk of the phase-change recording material mentioned above, an optical disk drive is unable to have an error-corrective access to the recordable optical disk by detecting the location of a defective sector from a PDL. An application program which is executed to control the optical disk drive is adapted to take an error-corrective measure against a recovery error, a read error or a write error. A determination as to whether the error-corrective process is to be performed, and a specific procedure to have an error-corrective access to the recordable optical disk depends on the application program. For this reason, it is difficult to achieve a volume production of the recordable optical disks which are formatted so as to be compatible with any of plural application programs.